> Because we have no way to accurately measure how many calories your body actually uses.
Of course we do!
Weigh yourself every week for months and months on end.
If you're gaining weight, you're eating more than you're using.
If you're more or less maintaining weight, you're in balance.
If you're losing weight, you're eating less than you're using.
And yes, absolutely your body will adjust and adapt and these values will change. That's why we re-adjust and re-evaluate constantly - in fact weekly!
The entire point is to lose weight, which by very definition will reduce your calorie requirements, which will then require you to again eat less calories, which again will make you lose weight,
which.......
> This is why an "eat this, not that" approach works a lot better than an "eat less calories than you use" approach.
They're actually the same approach, one is just at a lower level of abstraction than the other. You're "eat this, not that" is basically just saying "avoid things that are very calorie dense, and as a result you will reduce your calorie intake". Of course, if I eat a lot of "this", I'm still going to put on weight, so your advice is too abstract to always work.
AND to include the "emotional" part, telling me I can't eat chocolate cake or have a beer sucks and it's too hard. I'm never going to sustain that for the rest of my life. Everyone slips up.
>>Of course we do! Weigh yourself every week for months and months on end.
Weight fluctuates a lot in the short term, which means that it is a very unreliable measure of one's progress. Furthermore...
>>The entire point is to lose weight
No, the entire point is to lose fat, and retain lean body mass. A simple scale will not show you these details, and even the fancy fat-measuring scales are grossly inaccurate.
>>Your "eat this, not that" is basically just saying "avoid things that are very calorie dense, and as a result you will reduce your calorie intake".
Nope. I don't have a problem with calorie-dense foods, because they keep me full for a longer period of time. What I do have a problem with is sugars, starches and simple processed foods. You know, things that spike insulin levels and increase both fat gain in the short term and risk of diabetes in the long term. The fact that these often times appear in calorie-dense foods does not mean that calorie-density itself is the problem. That's why an "eat this, not that approach" is useful: it can shed light on these types of discrepancies, as opposed to hiding them behind the calorie layer of abstraction. And ironically, keeping a simple list of foods to eat and foods to avoid is a lot easier than obsessively counting calories day in day out.
I have lost 35 lbs in the past six weeks or so. I could not have done it without my simple, digital scale. After using several methods of measuring progress, I realized that the scale is the only tool that isn't horribly prone to operator fluctuations in use. You can keep your calipers, your body tape, your impedance scale, I'll keep my scale, thank you very much.
> No, the entire point is to lose fat, and retain lean body mass.
This is a foolish thing to try to accomplish, as it's impossible to measure your progress and be sure that what you are doing is effective, unless you have your own underwater weighing device or DEXA pod or whatever.
You can effectively have one of two goals, gaining lean mass, or losing weight. It's pointless to gain lean mass unless you've lost enough weight that you'll be able to see the results of gaining mass. When you lose weight, you will also lose a certain amount of lean mass, which you can gain back easily, at least easier than it was to lose the weight.
My favored method for losing weight is to combine intermittent fasting, calorie restriction and carb restriction. I eat a small meal once a day. The other day I had a pub burger without fries and water, that was a rare meal where I had significant carbs. I also do light exercise consisting of a daily 2-3 mile walk. I've gone from 205 to 170 so far, and intend on continuing until I hit 160-155. I trick hunger with small spoonfuls of almond butter.
It sucks for energy and mood but it's fantastic for weight loss. I suspect the energy and mood part are largely mental. What I love about it is that I'm literally melting away years of neglect in the space of a few weeks. I didn't start out so strict, I used to eat a lot more calories in my one meal, around 1300-1500. Now it's closer to 5-900.
At some point I will stop starving myself and start lifting again. I used to try to do both, lose weight and gain lean mass, but without tools I could use to make sure I was on the right track I just gained muscle and kept the fat.
It doesn't even tell you that very well. If you are losing muscle, you are likely becoming less healthy. The scale is an awful tool for measuring health.
I think you've lost track of the big picture here. Measuring against the goal of weight loss is the point. In absolute terms it's a terribly inaccurate way of finding calorie use, but in diet-management terms it's perfectly sufficient. Despite a multi-pound margin of error, given several weeks of data you'll have more accurate information on net calories than on income.
Of course we do!
Weigh yourself every week for months and months on end.
If you're gaining weight, you're eating more than you're using.
If you're more or less maintaining weight, you're in balance.
If you're losing weight, you're eating less than you're using.
And yes, absolutely your body will adjust and adapt and these values will change. That's why we re-adjust and re-evaluate constantly - in fact weekly!
The entire point is to lose weight, which by very definition will reduce your calorie requirements, which will then require you to again eat less calories, which again will make you lose weight, which.......
> This is why an "eat this, not that" approach works a lot better than an "eat less calories than you use" approach.
They're actually the same approach, one is just at a lower level of abstraction than the other. You're "eat this, not that" is basically just saying "avoid things that are very calorie dense, and as a result you will reduce your calorie intake". Of course, if I eat a lot of "this", I'm still going to put on weight, so your advice is too abstract to always work.
AND to include the "emotional" part, telling me I can't eat chocolate cake or have a beer sucks and it's too hard. I'm never going to sustain that for the rest of my life. Everyone slips up.